SANSCRIT POEM BY SHRl HARSHA. 



327 



O offspring dear I to whom will you extend 

 Your gaping bills, when parents are no more ? 

 Alas ! alas ! your fate will soon be sealed, 

 On saying this the bird had swooned away. 

 Had not the flowing tears from Nala's eyes. 

 Recovered him to sense and life again. 

 The King, with pity touched, the bird dismissed. 

 And said, since I have seen thy handsome form. 

 And on thy bright and varied plumage gazed, 

 No more complain to me, but go in peace. 

 When liberated from the monarch's hand. 

 His friends around him flocked, and they 

 Who mourned before with burning tears of grief. 

 Now followed him with melting tears of joy. 



Most of the descriptions in the Naishadha relate to works of nature and 

 art, or to the passions of the mind, particularly of love. The sun, moon, 

 stars and night; groves, trees, rivers and ponds ; cities, palaces, houses and 

 shops, together with the varied emotions of the soul are depicted in lively 

 colours. There are many passages in the seventeenth book in which the 

 bad passions are personified with considerable effect. When Kali is met 

 by the gods, he is represented as attended by lust, anger, avarice and folly, 

 his leaders or generals, together with a large army of other passions. 

 The leaders are described, and in perusing the account, the classical reader 

 is strongly reminded of the picture of Envy drawn by the hand of Ovid 

 in the second book of his Metamorphosis.* The following is the repre- 

 sentation given of folly : — 



* To save the trouble of-reference and enable the reader to compare for himself we quote 

 these striking lines. 



Videt intus edentem 



Viperias carnes, vitiorum alimenta suorum, 



